Date: Tue, 7 Jan 1997 15:07:00 -0500
Subject: M-G: Re: M-I: Re: Ebonics


Hugh's comments on ebonics are very interesting and he certainly has a point
in his emphasis on the richness  -- and essential equality  -- of all
vernacular speech.   Certainly ebonics continually feeds into and enrichs
standard English.  No one is suggesting that a Black youth should wash his
mouth out with soap if he utters an ebonics phrase.

The question is what is the role of *schools*?  I would suggest one needed
task is to teach the written language of the particular country/culture.  If
this is not mastered then a huge amount of knowledge cannot be passed on to
the person so inflicted.  Take, for example, Haiti.  There the people speak a
patois so distinct from standard French as to be incomprehensible to most
French-speakers.  Yet the newspapers, the schools, the literature of the
country are written in standard French.  The fact that many Haitian workers
and peasants cannot read or write standard French is a devastating
inhibition.

So, while ebonics may be equal to, even superior to, other vernacular forms
of English, it is greatly limiting if not gone beyond to standard English
forms.

One note on the unconjugated "be."  This form of speech does not appear in
Langston Hughes' rich vernacular poetry  and short stories based on the rural
south in the 30s.  And it is a ridiculously limiting linguistic peculiarity!




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